Category

Lounge Review

Air France has long enjoyed a prestigious reputation, seen by many as a standard bearer for sky-high luxury. When the airline rolled out a completely redesigned business class in 2014, featuring a new hard product and improved ground services, it was intending to solidify its place at the top of the competitive premium transatlantic market. The onboard experience has done just that, garnering plenty of positive publicity in the years since its introduction. The recently renovated lounges have not attracted similar amounts of attention, although they probably should. Don’t read too far in to this coverage (or lack thereof), the Salon for Air France’s international business passengers is excellent through and through.

A crew member, as is typical on international flights, offered landing cards and customs declaration forms during our final approach in to London. She strolled through a second time shortly thereafter, but now presenting pamphlets informing premium passengers of access to expedited immigration and a (mysterious) arrivals lounge. I was eager for the former — Heathrow is notorious for its long waits early in the morning — and curious about the latter. Because there wasn’t a lot of available information, the cynic in me expected a lame continental breakfast stuffed in to a closet. That would’ve been better than nothing… but man, this was even better than something!

Finding the Royal First Lounge at Bangkok Suvarnabhumi was a bit of a challenge when we first arrived for our departing flight. While the airport is physically stunning, actually navigating it is more problematic. It doesn’t help that everything is just so spread out. We entered the terminal at the wrong end, and had to walk what seemed like miles (it was actually a quarter mile, but still, that’s pretty far) until we finally found what we were looking for: the premium check in desk. It only got better — much, much better — from there.

When it came time to return to Bangkok after visiting Siem Reap, we were preparing for another ordinary, unremarkable experience courtesy of AirAsia. We certainly weren’t expecting something luxurious during any part of the leg, and we didn’t anticipate anything more after we learned that there is a Priority Pass lounge at the Siem Reap airport. Discovering its existence was a pleasant surprise — we figured something is better than nothing — but we didn’t get our hopes up. “How good could a contract lounge at a regional airport in the middle of a jungle really be?” we thought to ourselves. Turns out, we were in for another surprise.Continue reading “Plaza Premium Siem Reap Lounge Review”→

After our exhausting 13 hour flight from Washington, my father and I were eager to visit the United Club at Tokyo Narita for some food, some drinks, and some showers. We made our way from our arrival gate, 36, to the transfer desk to collect boarding passes for the next leg. We were directed to clear security again, but thankfully, the lines were short and the officers were efficient. Soon enough, we were on our way down an escalator, and at the bottom of it, we found ourselves in front of the entrance to the United Club. Continue reading “Tokyo Narita United Club Review”→

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